Employability of Disabled Graduates: Resources for a Sustainable Employment

Self-Perceived Employability of Workers With Disability: A Case Study in an Educational Farm

Background

The job placement of persons with disability is often threatened by prejudices and stereotypes; even when they are employed, they have less qualified and less paid jobs. The aim of this study was to investigate the self-perceived employability in a sample of workers with disability, hypothesizing to find a good level of self-determination and positive meaning of work.

Materials and Methods

Ten semi-structured interviews have been conducted, applying a mix-method to the data analysis through qualitative interpretation and quantitative content analysis. Results confirmed what recent literature shows about the need for job inclusiveness for persons with disability and also underlined a profound sense of satisfaction related to the job, strong identity, and empowerment derived from the job involvement.

Conclusion

Practical implications are related to the job design procedure inspired by diversity management, in order to pay attention to every single diversity and ensure equity and inclusion.

Impact of Self-Perceived Employability on Sustainable Career Development in Times of COVID-19: Two Mediating Paths

The outbreak of COVID-19 added further stress to individuals’ work life, and employability may be especially important to help individuals to pursue sustainable career success in such a context. However, previous studies that examined the impact and the mechanisms of employability on sustainable career success are lacking, especially in the context of pandemic threat. Based on conservation of resource theory (COR), the current study aims to explore whether and how employability, as an important resource, reduced work-related emotional exhaustion and increased work engagement during the COVID-19 pandemic. We expected that self-perceived employability would reduce emotional exhaustion and increase work engagement. We further expected that coping strategy mediated the effect of self-perceived employability on emotional exhaustion, and career commitment mediated its effect on work engagement. Data were collected via a national survey in China among a sample of 4990 human resource practitioners from October to December 2020 amid the COVID-19 outbreak. The proposed model was tested with structural equation modelling. Results supported the proposed model. Self-perceived employability reduced emotional exhaustion and to a larger extent, increases work engagement. The two mediating effects were of partial mediation. The implications of the results for theory and practice are discussed.

Not a stranger to the dark: discrimination against autistic students and employees

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to reveal barriers and their coherences between discrimination and self-perceived employability which students and employees on the autism spectrum often face and need to overcome. These include discrimination based on disability, when applying for a job or retaining employment. This research located barriers in three different categories: formality – problems that focus on organizational structures in the application process; social – communication and interaction problems; and job demand barriers – obstacles that epitomize work-related strains.

Design/methodology/approach

Barriers and discrimination can prevent individuals from accessing the labor market which can lead to severe consequences for an individual on the autism spectrum, such as poverty, social deprivation or lack of health promotion and equal treatment. Self-perceived employability can be regarded as an additional strength, as it describes the perception of an individual’s own skills and versatility to acquire and keep a job. In total, 53 German-speaking individuals on the autism spectrum participated in an online survey.

Findings

Results showed statistically significant coherences between both, formality and social barriers with discrimination. Formality barriers also indicated statistically significant coherences with self-perceived employability. A mediation model with discrimination as mediator between each category of barriers and self-perceived employability was examined. The non-significant results suggest that discrimination does not work as a superior construct but as a sole influence next to barriers and self-perceived employability.

Originality/value

Individuals on the autism spectrum epitomize a less common research approach. Moreover, diversity policies and practices in the workplace often do not focus on including individuals on the autism spectrum even though the employment rates for this specific group of potential highly qualified employees were reported to be consistently lower when compared to any other group of disabled people. Findings suggest possible starting points for future research, which are discussed alongside practical strategies to overcome barriers and change discriminatory attitudes toward skilled individuals on the autism spectrum.

Am I Fit for Tomorrow’s Labor Market? The Effect of Graduates’ Skills Development during Higher Education for the 21st Century’s Labor Market

This study contributes to the employability skills debate by investigating how students’ self-perceived 21st century skills relate to the self-perceived fit between their higher education curriculum and their future labor market for a sustainable entry to this labor market. Survey data from 4670 fourth-year students over a period of four years were analyzed. Furthermore, out of this group, 83 students were monitored longitudinally over their full educational student careers. Results showed a positive relationship between students’ self-perceived 21st century skills and their self-perceived “education-future labor market fit”. Among more recent cohorts, a significant improvement in their self-perceived 21st century skills was found. Overall, this study indicated that in order to deliver “employable” graduates, students need to be thoroughly trained in 21st century skills, and their development should be retained and expanded. This is one of the few studies that uses a vast amount of both cross-sectional and longitudinal data on skills and labor market perspectives among new graduates.

Teaching Down to Earth—Service-Learning Methodology for Science Education and Sustainability at the University Level: A Practical Approach

The Bologna Process and the European Higher Education area require the application of new active methodologies in the classroom that place the student at the center of his or her learning process. In the present work, we analyze the application of a Service-Learning (SL) methodology in the context of a Final Degree Dissertation (FDD) in the degree in Environmental Sciences at the University of Extremadura (Spain). The project deals with an isolated Kichwa community in Ecuador and involves the development of alternative science education materials for the capacitation of in-service science teachers. This paper evaluates how an FDD carried out according to Service-Learning (SL) principles can help in the acquisition of so-called “soft skills” and how these can be focused in the promotion of the sustainable development goal (SDG) knowledge and achievement. To this end, a qualitative study of the experience and a deep evaluation, followed by a final reflection, were carried out. According to the preliminary results, we can conclude that Higher Education should include SDGs in its teaching praxis and could do this successfully using the SL methodology.

Social Exclusion and Labor Market Integration of People with Disabilities. A Case Study for Romania

This empirical study contributes towards identifying the effect of social exclusion on labor market integration of people with disabilities in Romania. Certain categories of individuals with disabilities have longer unemployment duration than others and this empirical study is focused on identifying which variables have a significant influence on exit to job hazard on Romanian labor market. The significant gap between employees without disabilities and employees with disabilities in the Romanian labor market can be explain based on certain influential factors such as: Lower productivity levels, higher training costs, differentiated work schedules, special demands, higher risk of work injuries and work-related accidents, etc. The findings reveal the lack of statistical significance for the differences between median survival time and hazard rates of disabled individuals, a function of their disability. Moreover, our results show that only an age and unemployment allowance has had a significant effect on unemployment duration and exit to a job hazard of educated individuals with disabilities.

Supporting Employability by a Skills Assessment Innovative Tool—Sustainable Transnational Insights fromEmployers

Employability remains an important subject in the European and international context. This is the first qualitative and quantitative transnational research of the perception of the heterogeneous sample of employers regarding a sustainable and experimental innovative tool for the assessment of competencies to support employability. The aim of this study is an empirical examining of the employers perception from Austria, Romania and Sweden, from five different sectors of activity regarding a sustainable and innovative online tool for continuous assessment of skills to support employability. In the study, a quantitative analysis was carried out using data based on Eurostat indicators for quality of employment and a qualitative analysis using face-to-face interviews. Our results show that even if there are significant statistically differences regarding the quality of employment according to the Eurostat indicators, all these countries have a good, equally and strong perception with an innovative and sustainable tool for continuous assessment of skills to support employability. The research results fill a gap in the existing literature and offer a new and argued point of view regarding the continuous assessment of competences from the employer’s point of view from the three different countries as regarding the social, economic and political aspects.